Saturday, May 21, 2011

For me, writing is about getting it right the first time. I know. There are lots of folks out there who do quite well by spitting out thousands of words over a short period of time, then going back and editing. That's not for me. I write a few hundred words. Then pour over those words again and again. I hack and whittle, expand and add. This is the second rewrite of the opening of Born Fighting - dedicated to two very dear folks. If you look at the post below this one (or not: I don't really give a fuck) you'll see the first draft. This is the second. It's closer to where I want to be with the work, though there are still rough spots to which I must attend. Weekends are good for that.

Larry whipped the drivers license across the room and kicked off his stool. The latter skidded across the cabin's wooden planks, and then tipped to the floor. “FUCK!” He stood as rage shook him. His bandy legs trembled. His eyes were bright and bulging. Spittle sprayed from his mouth as he cursed.

“How the fuck was I supposed to know she's a fucking mute!” Larry stood shaking and stared at the ceiling, open to the rafters, before he grabbed fistsful of his thinning hair in both hands and shook his head wildly. “Fuck!” He stomped back and forth across the planks, slamming each foot down and executing a sharp spin at either end of the small room.

“Fucking mute. Fucking deaf and fucking mute. Jesus fucking Christ!”

Larry thrashed his head wildly, elbows akimbo. “Goddamnit!” He kicked the stool, and it flew wildly across the room where it smashed against the cabin's rude walls. "She can't fucking hear me. She can't fucking talk! How is she going to appreciate my fucking art?" Larry stomped and shook his head. It was starting again. The insects. The fucking insects. Crawling, swarming his body, from the in-fucking-side! It was like ticks and beetles and fucking-ants marching through his guts scurrying along the inside of his skin, holding little fucking bug-meetings in his brain. In his goddamn brain! He could hear their twitters, feel their antenna stroke the gray curls and whorls of his brain. His fucking artist's brain!

And somehow, Larry knew it was her. That fucking Indian woman. He didn't know how Sage Fucking Ravenwood had squirmed into his head. But it he knew it was her. Her and her eyes, her big fucking chocolate eyes. Sage Fucking Ravenwood kept those eyes wide open and staring, as Larry worked his artistry across her skin, her mouth stretched in silent screams. It was just the beginning for her, when he scraped her skin smooth, not that dirty brown, but red and bright, like Chinese porcelain. Those fucking Chinese. He'd had a Chinese girl once. That girl's voice was high and sweet, and she knew his art. She fucking knew it! That little Asian girl had sung his glory in that birdlike voice, twittering in Cantonese. Until he tasted her tongue - boiled it like a fucking cabbage, with carrots and taters and peas. She had porcelian skin, too, by the time he was done. Stripping it. Scraping it. Loving it. The fat that he scraped from the back of her skin was sweet and needed no spice. The skin itself crisped up like bacon in his old, iron skillet. Her fingers and toes were like popcorn, cracked free at the knuckles and charred over an open flame. But it was the Chinese girl's hair that Larry loved must about the girl. Black and straight, it hung to her waist, then to her knees, then to her feet, as worked the girl's body down to a manageable size.

Sage Fucking Ravenwood had long hair, too. A fucking black river of hair, undulating like a water moccasin skating across a cedar swamp. That black hair was smooth in his hands. In his mouth. In his way. In the way of his art! Of his high fucking art! And Larry brushed that luxurious hair again and again, washed it and brushed it till it shined, and then combed it out in great clumps until 49 strands clung to her scalp, weaving like snakes.

Goddamnit, he knew Sage Fucking Ravenwood was in his fucking head, and she had been for the last two days and nights, ever since he snatched her sweet ass off the streets of Pleasantville. An Indian – a native fucking American who shouldn't have been out on the fucking streets in the middle of the fucking night any-fucking-way!

“Jesus fucking Christ!” He screamed the curse and let go of his own hair long enough to sweep one arm across a table. Tin cans, a plate and a scattering of silverware jangled across the floor, a bright cacophony of metal and glass in the cabin's single, dark room.

“How can she appreciate my fucking artistry, huh?” The room, but for Larry, was empty and dim. Two windows set deep in the cabin's walls, were crusty with a build-up of grease and filth. What light filtered in was weak and piss-yellow; it reached tentatively into shadows and dark corners.

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

I'll have to settle for about 370. Damnit. It's all there in my head. But I want this one to be fucking perfect. There's folks what need killing. This has to happen correctly.

--Born Fighting - Vicious Vampire Erotica

“Sage fucking Ravenwood. Sage FUCKING Ravenwood!”

Larry threw the drivers license across the room and kicked off his stool. The latter skidded on the wooden planks of the cabin, then tipped to the floor. “FUCK!” He stood. Rage shook him. His eyes were bright and bulging.

“How the fuck was I supposed to know she's a fucking mute!” Larry stared shaking at the open ceiling, grabbed fistsful of his thinning hair and shook his head wildly. “Fuck!” He stomped back and forth across the planks, slamming each foot down and executing a sharp spin at either end of the small room.

“Fucking mute. Fucking deaf and fucking mute. Jesus fucking Christ!”

She was in his head. Goddamnit, he knew Sage Fucking Ravenwood was in his fucking head, and she had been for the last two days and nights, ever since he snatched her sweet ass off the streets of Pleasantville. An Indian – a native fucking American who shouldn't have been out on the fucking streets in the middle of the fucking night any-fucking-way!

“Goddamnit!” Larry thrashed his head wildly, elbows akimbo. He felt the insects again. Crawling, swarming his body. From the in-fucking-side! It was like ticks, and beetles and fucking-ants marching through his guts scurrying along the inside of his skin, holding little fucking bug-meeting in his brain. In his goddamn brain! He could hear their twitters, feel their antenna stroke the gray curls and whorls of his brain. A fucking artist's brain!

“Jesus fucking Christ!” He screamed the curse and let go of his hair long enough to sweep one arm across a table. Tin cans, a plate and a scattering of silverware jangled across the floor, a bright cacophony in the cabin's single, dark room.

“How can she appreciate my fucking artistry, huh?” The room, but for Larry, was empty and dim. Two windows set deep in the cabin's walls, were crusty with a build-up of grease and filth. What light filtered in was a weak piss-yellow, reaching tentatively into shadows and dark corners. The logs making up the one-room cabin were ancient, and the chinks between them had been stuffed and re-stuffed with a mixture of moss and mud.

Monday, May 16, 2011

Writing the characters of psychos, killers, and Femdom vampires isn't as easy as one might think.

You know that old saw: Write what you know.

I admit to being slightly unhinged. (Did I say slightly? I meant completely.)

I don't think I've killed anyone. Threatened a lot of folks. Beat down some punks who thought a chick was an easy target. (NOTE: Motorcycle helmet makes a great weapon.) But I don't remember actually killing anyone.

And while I'm definitely a Dominant Female (Femdom, for those of you who don't know the lifestyle), I'm not a vampire.

Write what you know. It just doesn't hold a lot of meaning to me when I stride out into the supernatural. I mean, fuck, do you think Stephen King is a fucking ghost? And yet, he's written about dozens of the wispy critters. Do you think the ever-sweet Ania Ahlborn has ever killed anyone? (Hmm. Sweetness is a good cover, so I might have to give this one a maybe.) And yet Seed, coming soon everywhere, threatens all kinds of killing.

The point is (you knew I had to get back to the point) that to really understand a character requires research. Real killers. Made up killers. (The voices in my head.)

I prefer the psychopath. Not necessarily a killer, though my psychopathic vampires do tend to slaughter folks. But they do so without conscious.

And that brings me to my point. Dead Hooker in a Trunk has some of the best psychopathy portrayed in a movie that I've seen. I've seen movies more gruesome, and flicks with disturbed murderers. But Dead Hooker ... I can't give a lot away. But I've got to talk about a single scene, and I'll do it without giving away the story.

It's either Jen or Sylvia - I've never met them face-to-face, and I can't tell the Twisted Twins apart - who at one point beats down a trucker who wasn't paying attention. That single scene is so perfect, so realistic, that in that moment you realize that Jen (or Sylvia) is a true psychopath - absolutely without conscious.

She's not a murder. Although she does her fair share of killing. She's not hopelessly disturbed. She's an out and out psychopath.

Either one of the twins from Dead Hooker could be models for one of my vampires. They're perfect.

That's the kind of research I do when I begin a story. I read a lot. I watch a lot. I pay attention when someone does it perfectly.

Sunday, May 15, 2011

This is pulled out of Divine Wine. The vampire's got her eye on the killer and stalks him in the streets:

As I watched him over the next few weeks, I got to know the little fucker better. His given name was Steve, though he preferred the nom de guerre, “Johnny Slash.” He has a broken front tooth and a jagged scar above his eyebrow. His nose is smashed. He's gangly and favors loose-fitting t-shirts that hide his scrawny frame. He wears baggy pants and carries a large, serrated hunting knife. He has beady eyes the color of dark chocolate and greasy, lank, lemon-yellow hair that hangs in strands that nearly brush his shoulders.

In a city that's nearly half black, and whites are outnumbered three to one, the little fucker belongs to a gang of thugs who called themselves the “White Aryans of 18th Street.” Arrogant and puerile little shits, each one strangely violent in his own way. Rape and murder isn't uncommon to any of them, but the little fucker outshone his entire gang. He enjoys killing, and he prefers his sex partners dead and on the ground.

In the two weeks that I shadowed the boy, he killed and raped three women, as well as murdering a child. All four of them were dark-skinned and pretty. The women had big asses and tits to match. He took the women near the screamo bar and dragged them into the same alley where he had fucked the first corpse. The child was playing after dark in a schoolyard, when he pulled her into a nearby stand of bushes and beat her to death. She was the only one that he didn't touch after she was dead.

I understood why the ghoul followed him so closely. The little fucker is like a walking morgue, leaving corpses in his wake: a banquet for ghouls. But that kind of murder won't go unnoticed for long by the police. And even though none of the women were the cute, blond, cheerleader-types, the media slavers over, reporters will come howling if any of them think there’s a serial killer in the city.

He's perfect. Exactly what I was looking for in the concrete, steel and neon glare that makes up Atlantic City. The little fucker is a brutal and confident killer. Five times I'd seen him kill, and four times I'd seen him rape corpses within screaming distance of large crowds. The boy feels invulnerable, and he is incautious in his murders and the aftermath.

Saturday, May 14, 2011

I got feedback on the cover design from many of the good folks at Twitter. Some liked it the way it was. Others suggested changes.

While I am a true, fucking goddess, the ways and means of Gimp are vast. There's

always some way to do something - ways to tweak art and images to perfection.

Alas. That kind of perfection is beyond my grasp, but Dustin Ashe kicks ass at that kind of stuff. Me? I work at it long and hard. Most times, I end up overworking an image. This is probably one of those times.

But still, I'm happy with the result. And making me happy is what I'm all about. My happiness matters.

So, this is the new cover. I'll likely sleep on it overnight, but just as likely, it's the cover that you'll see on Amazon and Smashwords.

I've spent most of another day working on my short story, Divine Wine. 14 hours to be more precise. Part of the time was spent tweeting. Most of the time was spent editing, sweating and pushing my way through.

But even after I finished the story, I had to come up with cover art. I think I'm nearly there. I love the Vampire. The city's not bad. Bottom of the book is lacking. But I'm too damn tired to go any further.

Friday, May 13, 2011

There's a cutesy application going around Twitter, pressing digital lips and tongue to your screen as an apparent way to show affection. As an application of love, #Twitkiss is fine for the younger set - those horny-as-hell pre-pubescent teens and the barely conscious 20-somethings rolling around in beer and whore-moans.

But when it comes to the older group - especially those of us who've never seen one another and will likely never see one another - the #Twitkiss comes across as creepy and self-serving.

I guess this goes back to the psycho-ex who could walk into the room and say "Love you," to my daughter without meaning it. Words symbolizing affection spewed from the psycho's lips like vomit.

The psycho-ex would have had no problem sending a #Twitkiss to every single person, everywhere, because "love" meant nothing.

I think that's why the #Twitkiss irritates me so much. If you've no intention of pressing your real lips to my real lips, then keep the Twit off my screen.

Well, truth be told, I could probably eat a cat. They're wiry little critters, with too little meat and too much muscle, but yeah - given enough time in the pot, I could eat one.

But why would I want to? Simple. My daughter's cat is driving me nuts. The only thing that saves its furry little hide is that it saved my daughter's life.

That sounds overly-dramatic, but it's true. When the psycho-ex walked out on us a couple of years ago, my little one was crushed. She didn't like the psycho much more than I did, but desperately wanted a stable family. My girl wanted parents who loved one another.

Truth be told, the psycho-ex and I could barely tolerate one another's presence. I tried, for my daughter's sake. I was polite. I didn't scream, nor rip the skin off the psycho's face. I wanted to, but I didn't. The psycho, on the other hand, began spending more and more time away from home. Overnight and week-long trips were not uncommon. When the psycho left in February 2009, both my daughter and I felt relief. Sure, it's tough taking care of a young one by my lonesome, but it was actually better for us.

Four months later, the divorce papers came. My daughter was crushed. She was glad the psycho was gone, but wanted that stable family. It was around that time that my daughter began pestering me for a cat.

I could see that she needed something in her life. She had a good counselor, but needed something more. I relented. We got the cat - four months old and as sweet as you'd want. My daughter insisted that the cat be an indoor cat, and again, I relented. I prefer outdoor animals, as they don't shit in the house. But like I said: The daughter needed something more than counseling. But therein lies the glitch.

The cat didn't have any feline role models to learn from, and the cat took to chumming around with my then 13-year old dog. The cat picked up dog behavior. That's fine in my dog - part chow, part huskie with a temperament to match - but annoying as hell in a cat.

Flash forward two years. My dog, now 15 years old, is having problems getting around. I have to hold the door open for extended periods to get him in and out of the house. Two days ago, I heard the beating of padded feet as I opened the door for my dog.

Zip! The damn "indoor cat" zoomed out the door as the dog waddled inside.

I hate that cat. I had to tell my daughter that her cat escaped and, no, I didn't know where it went.

Shit. Fuck. Damn.

The cat eventually came back, and I wanted to pluck out its eyes. But my daughter interceded.

Thursday, May 12, 2011

It seems every time I turn my computer on or off, Windows wants to either install or configure some kind of upgrade. I waited 10 minutes this morning for that damn software to configure whatever upgrade it had sneakily downloaded last night.

That's 10 minutes that I could have spent working. Instead, I was stuck watching the little blue circle whirl around.

Fuck. When I turn the computer on, I'm ready to start working. When I turn it off, I'm ready to go to bed. I don't want to wait for this half-finished operating system to put on its make-up. Damnit. I've got things to do!

I've been threatening to switch to Ubuntu for the last couple of years. But typically some necessary bit of software has kept me from doing so. I'm not so sure that's the case anymore.

All but one piece of my software is platform independent. I use Open Office for word processing. Gimp for photo editing. Chrome as my browser.

Monday, May 9, 2011

I finished writing Divine Wine on Saturday. That was brutal. 15 hours spent in front of the computer, but I managed to work out the last 4,000 words. I planned to edit the short story - standing now at 9,800 words total - on Sunday. But I was beat by the day prior.

Writing until my brain oozes out my ears is never fun. But I wanted to finish the story. It was outlined. I knew where it was going. I had to finish.

But I just couldn't bring myself to edit on Sunday. Instead, I worked on the cover for the short story. I found the perfect piece of art - worked it over until my copy of Gimp began freezing. Apparently, I've picked up a nasty bit of malware known as XP Anti Virus 2011. I hate the little shits who program malware. If I could track them down, I'd kill 'em. And it wouldn't be a quick death. I'd mangle the little fuckers for a while first.

This morning, though, I pulled myself out of bed at 6:30 a.m. and edited for an hour before heading off to work. There's still a few more hours of editing left, but I've gotten a good start.

I figure the story will be somewhere above 10,000 words when I'm finished. It's violent and brutal: Just what you'd expect when a vampire meets a serial killer.

Saturday, May 7, 2011

Well, not exactly, but damn close. The story is finished, but now I've got to edit Divine Wine. The story is currently 9800 words, and that could go up or down by a couple of hundred words in the editing process.

Most likely, up. See, I started getting tired near the end of the story. I've been writing since 6 a.m., and it's 9 p.m. now. That's 15 hours of tapping away on the keyboard. My eyes are bloodshot. My fingers are worn to nubs. I'm bitchy, and there's no one home for me to take my rage out on.

Sure, I've got a dog. But he's old. Real old. I don't get angry with him anymore. I've got a cat that's just as old, and stalks the house like a zombie. I feel sorry for the cat.

But I've got kids! Yep. I could take some rage out on them, and they'd bounce back. They're tough little shits. I raised them that way.

After the psycho-ex left, it was up to me to make sure the kids could stand up to anything - including me.

That's not easy. Most folks are leery of me, because of what they think I might be capable of. I let 'em think it. I don't like people anyway.

Friday, May 6, 2011

There are times when stuff just seems to get in the way of writing. Or at least, I let stuff get in the way of writing.

Take this week for example. I nearly finished my latest story, Divine Wine, last Sunday. I was within a thousand or so words of wrapping it up. Monday morning, I cranked out about 300 words, and edited another 200. Then it was off to work.

When I got home, there was email waiting in my personal account. It was from my attorney. See, a couple of years ago, my psycho-ex walked out on me and the kids, and filed for divorce a few months later.

The divorce dragged on for a couple of years, but the bottom line is that I have to split everything I own with the psycho.

Fast forward to Monday night. My house is on the market, and I've got to split profits with the crazy one. No one's looked at the house for about six months, and the attorney wanted to know how things were going. When she found out no one had looked at the house (her fee is wrapped up in those profits), she lit a fire under the ass of the real estate agent.

That set me on edge for Monday. On Tuesday, the agent called to set up an appointment for someone to look at my house this Friday. I spent the week cleaning and fuming.

I don't really want to move. I can't afford the house and hate the neighbors. I'd be better off in another house, but hate the prospect of moving, and I don't like feeling as though I've been shoved out of my current house.

Yeah, I know. I just can't be please. Get used to it. Nothing and no one please me for long -- except for Sam. (None of your business.)

So I've put off finishing Divine Wine for this entire week, because the prospect of moving has me crazy.

Tuesday, May 3, 2011

Review of Jesus Wept on Smashwords by Mike O'Connor: What an antidote to "The Passion of the Christ"! This story is a literary Deicide, raging with hate and searing blasphemy. Every word should be scrawled in the blood of a virgin. The only soundtrack is screaming death metal.

This is an author emitting hate and rage from every pore and orifice of her body. A crazed literary genius with a genuine talent to disturb. Spit more of your venom, because it tastes good.

Monday, May 2, 2011

One of my favorite things is corrupting minds. Ten years ago, Alice Dark and I co-edited Bloodfetish - Erotic Stories & Poetry. This is an unsolicited review of the book, on Smashwords.

Review of Bloodfetish by: Ernest Winchester: Normally not my choice of reading material, this pulled me in and held me till it chose to liberate me. I can only say I’m glad I have free will to refrain from reading more—for a while. But damn, I do have to say it’s well written. Also, I liked the picture even though the model is probably over a hundred by now.

When I was a kid I loved the classic vampire stories. As I grew up the stories changed until these days, they’re all about eternal love and how best to woo the heart of a teenage goth chick. Or, as Diana Trees puts it, they’re sparkly. In short, I have come to hate the vampire novel with a passion that rivals the depths of the emo self-pity felt by the average character in said books.

With that said, I happened across Diana Trees on Twitter and was immediately taken by the blurb on her account: “Vampires do not sparkle. They eat people.” How could I not dig deeper after reading that?! And so I did – for $.99 it was worth taking the risk.

I’ll admit I wasn’t sure right off the bat. The story felt a little odd at first, but not in a bad way. It had a nice flow to it and other than 1 or 2 exceptionally minor typos near the end of it, I was very satisfied with the mechanics of it. Sadly that is a rare thing in most interdependently published books, I’m sure even a few syntactical errors exist in some of my own books and those went through a publishing company.

The only problem I had with the book, if you can call it a problem, is how difficult it was for me to establish a rapport with the main character. After all, the main character is a vampire in a more traditional sense. She thinks and feels but she doesn’t pine away for some long lost love who has just been reborn into his or her great great great grandson’s body. The main character feels alien and vicious – and rightly so. Near the end I saw a bigger glimpse into her personal life that opened her up some. It was a good thing that showed character development. It made her feel a little more human without reducing her to glitter and sparkles.

Loved the introduction of some other supernatural beings without reducing it to the same old vampire vs. werewolf crap too. A fine job, Ms. Trees!

But there will be blood – and lots of it. Divine Wine does not lack in the blood and gore fest. I even contacted the author to mention I enjoyed her extremely gory book and she told me she appreciated the feedback and assured me I wasn’t to worry, the next one she’s working on has even more violence. Tuck the kids to bed and read it with the lights on and the doors locked!

It’s a novella and something I finished in a few minutes while waiting for the babysitter to arrive. Get it on Kindle or Nook – I recommend it for anyone who wants to spit in the face of the current trend in undead romanticism!

The paranormal erotica and romance genres have bloomed in recent years, and as anyone will tell you, much of the fare offered up is... well, pretty bland. The werewolves are emo, the vampires sparkle, everyone has flowing tresses and wears a lot of lace. Then comes along Diana Trees with 'Divine Wine', and - joy of joys! - the genre is as it should be. 'This little book is a racy, edgy, gritty grindhouse story, packed with intriguing characters and sexy monsters.

'Divine Wine' a short, sweet and gruesomely entertaining novella depicting the twisted tale of two predators - one human, and one not. The pair engage in a game of cat and mouse around the grimy docklands of New Jersey, culminating in violent confrontations with gang-bangers, innocent bystanders, and a pair of (strangely adorable) bonded ghouls.

I'm not usually a 'vampire person', but I was caught by the vivid depiction of Atlantic City at its seediest, and was helplessly drawn into the story by its atmosphere alone. Diana Trees has excellent pacing and style that makes for a thrilling read, never giving too much away about the characters or the outcome of the book. While possibly too dark for some, its not dark enough to be inaccessible, and if you're after visceral sensuality - the kind found in 'Silence of the Lambs' and 'American Psycho' - you'll probably get a kick out of 'Divine Wine'.

“Divine Wine” by Diana Trees is a fun story for readers that can handle the anti-hero concept with violence taken so far it becomes comical. The lead character seeks out violent criminals and places them in a nightmarish situation with every bit of inhumanity, brutality, and beyond what they gave to their victims. This “Evil meets Evil-er” story, not for the faint of heart, gets the reader laughing as the outrageous creatures have their own agenda outside of human society and are more than happy to bring in new criminals to satisfy their need for entertainment. Congratulations, four stars!